ALF in Shores to close; operator's record cited

Wednesday

Jan 9, 2013 at 5:35 PM

Reawattie Sugrim described the legal trouble as a misunderstanding. The Office of the Attorney General called it grand theft and Medicaid fraud. Florida's Agency for Health Care Administration concluded it was enough to merit non-renewal of Sugrim's license to operate an assisted living facility in Marion County.

By Fred HiersStaff writer

Reawattie Sugrim described the legal trouble as a misunderstanding. The Office of the Attorney General called it grand theft and Medicaid fraud. Florida's Agency for Health Care Administration concluded it was enough to merit non-renewal of Sugrim's license to operate an assisted living facility in Marion County.

The licensing agency has declined Sugrim's request to reconsider her case and ordered her to find new homes for her residents.

So the V&H Care ALF at 68 Palm Road in Silver Springs Shores, which has been in business for eight years, will close.

"We don't understand why they didn't allow us to continue," Sugrim told the Star-Banner during a telephone interview. "It was just an honest mistake."

Florida Medicaid fraud investigators and state prosecutors disagreed. They said the 44-year-old Sugrim continued to collect a mentally ill client's Social Security income for months after the resident relocated, pocketing $2,951.20. They also said Sugrim billed Medicaid and received another $2,794 for services never rendered to the absentee client.

In a November pre-trial intervention contract, Sugrim admitted guilt.

Investigators found the theft almost by accident. In 2010 the client contacted the Department of Children and Families to complain that, a few months before, he had been physically abused at V&H.

The man, whose name was not listed in court or AHCA documents, reported that he still had bruises on his chest, stomach and back from an attack.

Office of Attorney General investigator Andrea Chilton reported that while there was no evidence of physical abuse, the man had "been the victim of exploitation by the owner/operator of V&H Care ALF, Reawattie Sugrim."

Chilton said the mentally disabled man, who suffers from schizophrenia, lived for less than a year at the ALF, moving out in November 2009.

Chilton reported that based on her investigation, and according to subpoenaed bank records, Sugrim continued to collect the man's Social Security payments, including public assistance benefits, and pocketed the funds. She also billed Medicaid for services she falsely claimed to provide the resident.

Sugrim told the Star-Banner the resident in question had only temporarily left the assisted living facility.

"He went to rehab to try and get better for a month or two and we still had a bed held for him," she said. "He was scheduled to come back to the facility."

She told the Star-Banner she collected the client's money in exchange for holding a place for him.

But AHCA said there was no such agreement in writing between the client and Sugrim.

The pre-trial intervention program took care of the criminal part of the case. But that criminal case also came into play in the licensing arena.

Sugrim asked that her ALF license be renewed. She wanted AHCA to take into account that she supports two children and faces a foreclosure action.

The agency considered Sugrim's criminal record. In the final analysis, the said "the financial interests of individuals," when weighed against the exploitation of vulnerable clients, didn't justify renewing the license.